Tuesday, 15 December 2009

Gerry McCann, speaking on June 3rd, 2007: "Later this year (...)"

LET'S HOLD A MADELEINE DAY FOR THE WHOLE WORLD

Sunday June 3,2007By Jason GrovesDaily Express

ROCK legend Sir Elton John is being lined up to front a global pop concert, to carry the message of missing Madeleine McCann’s plight to every corner of the earth.It is hoped the singer will headline a huge series of worldwide events to mark a special Madeleine Day that her distraught parents are planning in the effort to find the vanished four-year-old. Sir Elton’s popular appeal is guaranteed to attract a swarm of other film and music superstars keen to offer support to parents Gerry and Kate McCann.The couple, having promised not to return home until they are reunited with Madeleine, are now planning a series of visits to European and North African cities, to distribute posters and widen the appeal for information.Sir Elton has played an emotional DVD of Madeline at his concerts, but now believes a larger effort would do more to raise awareness of her predicament.Gerry McCann, 38, said: “One of the ideas is maybe getting all the people who have publicly supported us to come together. I don’t just mean from the UK but from different parts of the world. We want a big event to raise awareness that she is still missing.“We would look at high-profile people who have already pledged support. It will be some sort of focus around an anniversary, to tell people thatMadeleine ’s still missing. I think it would be later this year, once media attention has dropped, to bring it back up, hopefully, for a short period.“It wouldn’t be a one-year anniversary, it will be sooner than that. What we’re doing at the minute has its role but doing that down the line in a few months won’t have anything like the same impact. We might have a sporting event, something arts, something music."We’ve had backing from sporting people up to now. We have had backing from certain musical celebrities as well. We’ve got some other musical contacts that we are exploring, who are happy to offer support.“We’re not saying it would necessarily be one big concert, it might be that on a certain day they are playing her DVD.“What we want at the current time is maximum message out there now, about her disappearance but then just events to bring it back up occasionally just to remind people, if she’s not found.”A month after the sleeping Madeleine was snatched from her bed, Gerry and Kate McCann have betrayed the first signs that their hopes of finding her alive are starting to fade.The couple confessed that they are haunted by the harrowing thought of her being held captive by a pervert. Still desperately clinging toMadeleine ’s pink Cuddle Cat, 38-year-old Kate said: “We don’t know where she is. We’d like to think she’s still in Portugal, she might still be in Portugal.“But we know there’s a possibility she’s gone over the border – or several borders. We know there are bad people out there, but we know there are also a lot of sad people. We hope it’s the latter.”Gerry added: “Of course we believe Madeleine is still alive but you would be incredible if you hadn’t considered the worst scenario, that she’s dead.“Kate and I discuss it – not a lot, but we talk about hope, and that while there’s some we will not give up. At the minute, there’s loads of hope.”

PS - Don't look for this story, on the Daily Express site. It was deleted, long ago...

3 comments:

I think you have every right to query Gerry's plans as it sounds rather like someone who is sticking to a very tight and very organised schedule. However, jugging by the scale of all of the couple's plans and the incredible ease with which they were able to higher a government representative, it suggests they were not acting alone, but had the assurance of much more powerful figures.

It doesn't offer definitive proof that they knew Madeleine would not be coming back - but it certainly gives that very strong impression.

What it doesn't answer is how or why they knew she wouldn't be returning to them so quickly (or at all).

Their continuing PR offensive suggests they wish to revive this schedule and campaign rather than drift quietly (and safely) back into obscurity. Not the behaviour of nervous killers perhaps, but the behaviour of scammers maybe. Scammers with some major backers and powerful handlers.

Just to add:We have to be careful when making statements like the one I made above because there is a very real possibility (even liklihood) that Gerry was simply repeating a script prepared by his very able Public Relations team.

I deal with people on a regular basis who have been primed and rehearsed by PR managers and it is often very difficult to get them to say anything that hasn't been screened by or already rehearsed with their PR team.

As soon as Gerry started using phrases like 'pan-European' it became obvious that he had been primed and groomed by Public Relation teams familiar with fashionable political speak and diplomatic functions. This was not a phrase that an ordinary man would use - but a diplomat or politician (an ordinary member of the public would use a phrase like 'Europe-Wide', 'all across Europe' or even - erroneously -'international').

Many people have already pointed out (and quite rightly) that Gerry's blogs were unlikely to have been written by Gerry himself - but by a PR team. I remember counting several American spellings of words (the noun 'licenSe' was one. This is the American spelling as British Driver will know. In the UK we spell it 'licenCe').

I have the conviction that someone close to the McCanns in a PR capacity knew she wasn't coming back (immediately, if at all) even if Gerry and Kate didn't know themselves. I think this is one thing we can be certain of - although I suspect Gerry and Kate were aware of it too.

The Americanisms suggest it might have been those in Washington - either the National Centre For Missing and Exploited Children or their contacts within iJet and Psy Tel.